Tim Pratt - Sympathy for the Devil

“Would you.” Merchari leaned in and inhaled her bouquet. A magnificent sample, probably lapsed Catholic. “Ooh, you are quality.” Her eyes flashed with irritation. “The important point is that you don’t have any prayers to protect you. If it makes it easier, you can pretend the fires are just hallucinations.”

Dennis started in with the Pater Noster again. Merchari jolted from his appreciation of the woman. “Sir, you’re done. Your exemption has been proven. But your prayers can’t help an unbeliever.” Merchari extended his hand. “Come along, girlie. You’re fair game.”

“Because I don’t have prayers.”

“That’s right. Don’t you logical types study the classics anymore? If you’d followed Pascal’s Wager, you’d at least hedge your bets. Too late now.”

The warm wind rose again, and a few tattered pages of an abandoned New York Times skittered down the sidewalk and clung to Christine’s calves. She kicked at them in vexation until the wind reclaimed them. “Which is Pascal’s Wager again?”

“Tell her, Catholic boy. They must have covered that at Fordham.”

“Manhattan College, actually.” Dennis still hovered protectively near the woman, but had calmed a bit. “You remember it from Grening’s class, don’t you, Chris? The one about how it won’t hurt to believe in God if there isn’t one, but not believing will get you sent to hell, so you may as well play it safe and believe.”

“Oh yeah, that one.” Christine flicked her fingers dismissively. “A false dichotomy. For it to make any sense, one must already believe the premise that there’s a deity who desires human faith, as opposed to, say, the sacrifice of animals. You might as easily suggest I hedge my bets by offering hecatombs to Zeus and Athena.”

Hmmmm.

The woman ran fingers through her short, blonde curls. “Look, I’ll take it as a given that you’re real, that you’re a demon, and that you’re here to take me to Hell. So let’s get back to the point. Do any holy words work? Like, if a Buddhist recited a koan, would that keep you off?”

Merchari narrowed his eyes. They didn’t usually converse. Usually they were too busy gibbering or running. “What’s with the questions?”

“Just the natural curiosity of a scientist.” The woman shrugged. “If you’re going to drag me off to Hell, the least you can do is show me the full error of my ways. Should I have listened to the nuns, or would any religion do?”

Ah, a theological discussion. It had been a while. “I don’t know. Someone recited from the Koran once-that worked. I know the… prayer your friend said works when recited in Chinese, although Latin is more effective.”

“Interesting.”

Dennis took her arm again. “Christine, what are you doing?”

“It’s okay, Dennis. Just relax.”

“That’s right, Dennis,” Merchari said. The man started at hearing his name from demonic lips. “Let me just conclude my business.”

Christine eased a step closer. “You got a name, demon?”

“That doesn’t work.”

“Huh?”

“The name thing. It doesn’t work.”

“I’m not a fricking wizard, I’m a biochemist.” Christine huffed her annoyance. Merchari smiled inwardly. They always got testy when they were losing. Christine continued: “If I don’t believe in you, I certainly don’t believe in that mystical crap. I just want to know what to call you.”

Oh. “Merchari.” He performed a courtly bow.

“Thank you. You know, Merchari, I think you’re wrong about something.”

“Oh? What’s that?” Still searching for loopholes! She was almost brave enough to get an exemption on valor alone.

“That bit about me having no holy words.” She raised her head and looked him square in the eyes. “Force equals mass times acceleration,” and she drove her fist into his face.

Shards of pain splayed behind his eyes and Merchari cried out. How had she done that? She’d hit him! And it had hurt! He staggered backwards and touched a hand to his nose. Silver fluid flowed down his face. “How-? You shouldn’t be able to touch me!”

Christine cradled her fist in her other hand, gritting her teeth. “Mercury for blood. Holy crap, that hurt.”

“Good. But how-?”

“Simple physical law.” She spat a few more choice imprecations and grimaced down at her red and swelling knuckles. “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction,” she muttered.

This was going to be a little harder than Merchari had assumed, but one human female couldn’t possibly take on a minion of Hell. She was a prime specimen, a grade-A atheist with spunk, and his reputation would be made if he bagged her. He would have his pick of assignments.

Merchari leapt at her, arms wide, ready to grab.

Instead of ducking, running, or clinging to Dennis, she calmly whirled to one side. Her arm darted out, and her hand seized his wrist, deftly avoiding the spur-talon. “An object in motion will tend to stay in motion-” And she pulled, accelerating him past her and throwing him to the ground.

He lay sprawled, dazed and in pain. She leaned over him.

“-unless acted upon by an external force,” she finished.

All right, no more playing around. Merchari leaped up, and hovered ten feet in the air. He unfurled his wings with a leathery snap, shredding his trenchcoat, and cranked up the heat on his fiery nimbus like a kid with a magnifying glass on an ant. It was a display that never failed to send the bravest human cowering.

Christine folded her arms across her chest and rolled her eyes. “What’s the fuel for those flames?”

“Fuel?” They were just his nimbus, unholy light, part of being a demon. What was she on about?

“Yeah, fuel. What are you burning?”

“Um…”

“Because you need to burn something. The total energy of a closed system remains constant.”

And with a woosh, his aura went out.

“And those wings are all wrong. In the first place, they’re not even built for flying, much less hovering. I mean, honestly-bat’s wings?” She craned her neck to get a better look. “You’re barely flapping. And they grow straight out of your back, practically vertical. How do you get any leverage?”

“They do me all right.”

“No, no, no. Can’t work. Force equals G-M-m over R-squared.”

Merchari blinked. “What?”

Christine sighed with exasperation. “The force of gravitational attraction between two bodies is equal to the universal constant G, multiplied by the masses of the two bodies, divided by the square of the distance between them. You’re too heavy. Those wings could never provide enough lift.”

And… Merchari suddenly felt his own weight, a crushing force, and he realized the problem with having heavy, dense mercury for blood. He flailed his wings, but he crashed to the ground, cracking the sidewalk with the force of his impact.

Christine crouched beside him and patted him on the head. “The Earth is large and you’re very close to it.” She stood and backed away from him. “I’m glad I didn’t have to cite the aerodynamic laws; it’s been a long time since undergrad physics.”

Dennis waved one of his hands in thought. “You need the angle of attack, and-and the surface area of the wing? And maybe the speed he flaps them?”

“Ugh, I can never remember; if I was any good at fluid dynamics I’d have been an engineer. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. The beginning of the explanation apparently was enough.”

This was intolerable! Merchari rolled to his side and snarled at Dennis. “Keep out of this, you, or I might forget the rules that protect you.” He spat a fang onto the pavement and stood to face the woman again. He was going about this wrong. He knew most of these laws, sort of. Hell had a whole section devoted to scientists. “You! Woman! Newtonian laws aren’t entirely accurate.”